I think that people should certainly read All Quiet on the Western Front, but I'm with you on the whole 'background' thing. You don't get much out of a work like that without understanding the historical context; WWI was a bad example of how to be a gracious winner (with the sequel of WWII and angry Germans as a bit of a case-in-point) but again just 'Yeah, the Germans, They Lost' is not enough.
Then again, I have to wonder if some people ever really have the ability to appreciate works like this. It's not like our culuture and video games try to go to great lengths to point out that, no, war really IS that bad, but it still needs saying.
Your comments remind me of two things:
1) Watching 'The Day After' in grade seven (...short version? Russia and the US trade nukes when the Cold War goes hot; EVERYONE LOSES OUT, who cares where the first shot came from?). Being vivid of the imagination and perhaps a little more thoughtful than some of my ilk, I did not sleep well for a while.
2) Going to Auschweitz & meeting a holocaust survivor with a tour group. Amazingly, some of the kids were STILL just carrying on and laughing like YOU ARE NOT IN A PLACE THAT 'PROCESSED' A MULTITUDE OF PEOPLE as we walked through it. Case in point; we were all high school age. Even more so? This survivor's sitting there as he talks to all of us, he points to me (I was still about 5'10 and built like a linebacker) and notes that out of the 30-40 people in the room, they'd work me to death instead of killing me like the other 99% of the room out-of-hand, were we to go to a camp.
Frankly, I think people need to be taught to appreciate history, but it worries me that not everyone seems to grasp the gravitas of some of this stuff.
no subject
Then again, I have to wonder if some people ever really have the ability to appreciate works like this. It's not like our culuture and video games try to go to great lengths to point out that, no, war really IS that bad, but it still needs saying.
Your comments remind me of two things:
1) Watching 'The Day After' in grade seven (...short version? Russia and the US trade nukes when the Cold War goes hot; EVERYONE LOSES OUT, who cares where the first shot came from?). Being vivid of the imagination and perhaps a little more thoughtful than some of my ilk, I did not sleep well for a while.
2) Going to Auschweitz & meeting a holocaust survivor with a tour group. Amazingly, some of the kids were STILL just carrying on and laughing like YOU ARE NOT IN A PLACE THAT 'PROCESSED' A MULTITUDE OF PEOPLE as we walked through it. Case in point; we were all high school age. Even more so? This survivor's sitting there as he talks to all of us, he points to me (I was still about 5'10 and built like a linebacker) and notes that out of the 30-40 people in the room, they'd work me to death instead of killing me like the other 99% of the room out-of-hand, were we to go to a camp.
Frankly, I think people need to be taught to appreciate history, but it worries me that not everyone seems to grasp the gravitas of some of this stuff.